God's Girls, Not Mine

It can be easy at camp to get into a mindset that says "I can do it all."  Thinking that I am the one who changes my girls, and that I am the one who is affecting my girls can be an easy thought pattern to slip into.  I get so caught up in the "me" mindset. I have to make my girls like camp. I have to start a good discussion. I have to make sure they learn about Jesus. I … I … I …

This week, God has showed me (again) how wrong that it.  This week is not about me.  A familiar phrase at camp is INAM.  "It's Not About Me."  Easy to say, not so easy to do.

I was reading in my quiet time on Monday and it hit me:

These girls are not MINE. They are HIS.

They were created in His image, by Him, through Him, and for Him.

Each one was created uniquely special.

Each one is at camp for a reason I may never know, but a reason nonetheless.

Each one is in God's sovereign care.

He is teaching them, shaping them, molding them. 

My job is to love them. To smile. To be obedient to Christ. 

My job is to be faithful to Christ.

There are tiles along our walk to the cafeteria here at Point Loma Nazarene University that read:

"May the ones who come behind find us faithful…"

I love that saying. I don't need to be perfect.  I don't need to see the fruit of my labor. I need to be faithful.

I pray that those who come behind me would find me faithful.  That staffers who work with me would know me as one who is faithful to Christ and His Word. That students that I work with would remember me as a servant of Christ, faithful and obedient.  That when I die, my eulogy would include this: She was faithful to Christ.

Weeks at camp aren't always easy.  "Easy" is actually a word I would never use in relation to camp.  It is hard to remember INAM.  It's even harder to carry it out.  It can be hard to love the unlovable students, or to know how to serve them effectively.  But I am called to be faithful and to serve God's girls that are in my path this summer.

As we walk the road of our Christian life, may we seek and desire to faithfully love those in our path.

"Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. and we are his house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope."  Hebrews 3:5-6.